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page 164 chapter V
cause some of the findings in economics are contra-
intuitive. That explains, but doesn’t quite fully excuse,
the fact that, in times of rising share prices, some investors
demand ever-higher, fantastic returns and expect
to see them keep increasing for ever. This, too,
calls for a certain degree of personal responsibility.
But, at this point, let‘s return to those cases where
banks are quite rightly criticised. In many cases – but
admittedly not all – an interesting phenomenon can
be seen as the cause: the scandal is not triggered by individual
acts or omissions of just a few individuals, but
by the coincidence of a large number of errors, none
of which would have been scandalous on its own. Just
as Hannah Arendt described it as “the banality of evil”
in the case of Eichmann, everyone adheres to his own
instructions, but does not understand that the things
they do may possibly be wrong or morally questionable.
Incidentally, this is the typical constellation of
catastrophes.
If you followed what I said about ethics, you can already
imagine what point I’m heading towards here: the perception
of responsibility, which is sometimes wanting
today. And when I say “perception of responsibility”, I
don’t in this case mean the “mea culpa” of a CEO, when
the horse has already bolted and that leads, at the very
worst, to his resignation (complete with “golden parachute”),
but the attempt to do everything possible to
prevent the occurrence of such a major disaster.
But is it really only top management that fails? No. Because,
although some executive boards may feel powerful,
their members are ultimately just employees of